


Won't You Lay Me Down in Tall Grass (and Let Me Do My Stuff)

by moonflowers



Series: Sweet [5]
Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Before you worry, Established Relationship, Fluff, Found Family, Fourth of July, Karen is in full on mom mode, M/M, Most of them already know but, Relationship Reveal, Soft Boys, Speedos, Summer Fic, monster fighting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-20
Updated: 2018-05-20
Packaged: 2019-05-09 11:56:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,092
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14715578
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moonflowers/pseuds/moonflowers
Summary: Fourth of July BBQ at the Byers'. Billy takes out a demodog with a lawn chair while wearing red speedos and smoking a cigarette. Other things happen too, but that's a highlight.





	Won't You Lay Me Down in Tall Grass (and Let Me Do My Stuff)

**Author's Note:**

> Everyone else just as thirsty for summer fic as I am? Good. I can only hope this delivers half as well as the fucking excellent summer fic some of you lot have already put out there. Title is from Fleetwood Mac's Second Hand News, and I know it's stupidly long but any shortened versions weren't quite right.  
> Maybe read the other parts first? Probably not necessary, but I do reference them a lot. Except don't read them too closely, because I haven't looked at them for a while and there's probably continuity errors all over the place.

Billy was nervous. It was obvious from the way he'd been aggressively chewing on his bubblegum the whole ride over, then at his thumb nail after Steve had told him to cut it out. From the fact that every other word out of his mouth was 'fuck,' that he'd been alternating between complete silence and running his mouth to try and get a rise out of him ever since they'd left the pool. Honestly, Steve was a little unsure about it too, but fucked if he was going to let Billy see that; it would only get him even more worked up. Instead of heading down to one of the many bonfires and parties in town, the two of them were going to the Byers' for a barbecue and fireworks. Joyce had wanted to start something of a tradition; too many things had been broken or disrupted for all of them in the past couple of years, and she wanted to make something new out of the crap they'd gone through. And their house was the ideal place - quiet, out of the way of the rest of town. They didn't have to be quite so careful about keeping a lid on any Upside Down talk - because even Billy knew now, as much as the kids didn't like it - and there was plenty of room out back for the kids to fuck around and Hopper to let off his questionable fireworks. Better there be less people around for El's sake too. Not everyone knew about the chief's adopted daughter in town just yet, and Steve guessed Hopper wanted to keep it that way a little longer if he could.

"Quit dragging your feet Hargrove," Steve stopped on the corner of the house to wait for him, "we're already late."

"Wasn't me who passed out by the pool, Sleeping Beauty," Billy said, still hanging back by the car "we lost at least twenty minutes because you refused to get the fuck up." 

The two of them had been at the pool all morning and most of the afternoon with the kids. They preferred it to the pool at Steve's - Dustin had rattled off a load of crap about tradition and atmosphere or whatever, but Steve had zoned out pretty quick and shoved a couple of bucks at him to go get some snacks. They'd lost track of time, and yeah Billy was exaggerating, but it kind of was Steve's fault they were later leaving than planned. He'd dozed off for a while, sure, but he also just plain enjoyed watching Billy lounge about by the pool. It was like watching a fucking lion reclining at the side of a watering hole, or some other dumb description the kids had a tendency to fire off without a moment's notice. A lion with abs and a cigarette and a tiny red speedo. Whatever. He knew Billy got just as much of a kick out of being looked at as Steve did looking, so he really didn't have anything to bitch about. Either way they'd lost track of time, caught a little too much sun, and by the time they'd herded all the kids up and gotten them home, they were so late they'd decided to skip showering and head straight to the Byers'. So there they were, dried off but still tacky with chlorine, and Steve couldn't get his boyfriend the last few feet around the corner.

"Yeah yeah," Steve went back, squeezed his shoulder and pressed a quick kiss to his mouth. It was meant as reassurance, but Billy deepened it, licked at the part of Steve's lips until he let him in. He still tasted like bubblegum. "You trying to distract me?" he said when Billy finally pulled away. 

"Now baby," Billy said with one last swipe of his tongue, all innocence, "would I do that?"

"Yes." Steve slipped a hand around his waist to nudge him further around the side of the house. "Come on hot stuff. The longer we wait around, the more we'll get bitched at for being late."

The Byers' back yard was mostly a big, dusty patch of grass, fringed by gangling weeds and dotted with pretty little blue and purple flowers that Steve didn't care enough about to know the names of. They were nice to look at though, and he figured that was enough. The kids were sitting half under the shade of the bedraggled row of pines at the far end of the yard, tired from a morning at the pool, stretched out and lazy in the sun. Nancy and Jonathan were spreading a blue tablecloth over an old picnic table, Hopper getting the grill ready, Joyce going to and from the kitchen armed with stacks of plates and cups and paper towels. Aware of how twitchy Billy was getting and not wanting to throw him in at the deep end, Steve called out a hello to everyone before dragging him over to a quieter corner of the yard, close to the house. He could see the discomfort on Billy's face, the nagging worry over whether or not he even had the right to be there.

"You hang out with these idiots all the time," Steve said, "you know it's no big deal, right?"

"Yeah, but this is different."

"How?"

"Because," Billy paused, tense and prickling, lip curled in frustration as he tried to explain himself, "because this is an actual thing, Harrington. Like a... a family thing. I shouldn't be here."

"Don't be stupid, we want you here," Steve said, and Billy scoffed. "I'm serious! Look, I - "

"Aw shit," Billy cut him off, looking at something over Steve's shoulder, face sliding smoothly from pissed off into his most perfect, practised smile.

"What?" Steve span around to see what he was looking at, just as Mrs Wheeler stepped out of the back door.

"Hey Mrs Wheeler," Steve said when she approached, heavily perfumed and not a hair out of place, "you staying for the barbecue?"

"Oh no," she said, smiling big and genuine, sun catching on her gold earrings, "Ted and I are spending the evening with some of his work colleagues. I just stopped by to say hi to the kids and drop off a couple of pies for everybody."

"Oh?" Billy said, in that slick, honeyed way he did when he was flirting to cover up how uncomfortable he felt. "From what I remember, you're a great cook, Mrs Wheeler." Jesus Christ, he was laying it on thick. Steve was ninety percent sure telling him to stop would only make him worse. Ninety five. Luckily Mrs Wheeler wasn't having any of it either. Which was a surprise, given what Billy had told him about a past encounter with her. 

"Aren't you sweet," she smiled and patted Biily's cheek in the same distinctly motherly way that Dustin's mom had started doing to Steve. He looked like he didn't know whether he wanted to smack her hand away or crack up laughing, like a kitten not sure if it wanted to play or bite. Steve tried to smother his laughter at Billy's outraged expression at her nicely manicured hand on his face. It wasn't altogether successful, and Billy turned to glare at him instead. "Well, there's a cherry and an apple I left in the kitchen with Joyce. You boys make sure you get some, alright?" She looked them both over with lips pursed and a worried frown. "I always worry about you kids eating enough. Especially you boys - there's so much going on, I feel like you forget to just sit down and eat something, sometimes."

Steve laughed weakly. If only she knew how on the money she was - they did have a lot going on, but he got the feeling she wasn't talking about demodogs and gateways to other dimensions. "Yeah." He wasn't sure what to say. It was sort of nice of her to worry, but neither of them were exactly weedy. His eye landed and stayed on the curve of Billy's ass a second too long. "We'll make sure we get some," Steve said, throwing her his patented 'I definitely haven't seen your daughter naked' smile, "thanks, Mrs Wheeler."

"We do miss seeing you Steve," she said, shooting a covert look over her shoulder as if to check no one was listening in. "Anyone else... special, in your life at the moment?"

"Uh..." he was suddenly very aware of the fading bite mark Billy had left on his chest under his shirt.

"Sorry, sorry," she shook her head, glossy hair bouncing, "none of my business, I know. But I hope you find yourself another lovely young lady soon."

Billy didn't even bother to try and hide his snort of laughter at that, and Steve fought the temptation to elbow him in the ribs. "Uh, thanks."

"No problem," she smiled again, and glanced down at her watch. "Damn, it's later than I thought, I'd better go find Ted. You boys have a good night, okay?"

"We will," Billy said smoothly, and Steve could feel his eyes on him, "thanks, Mrs W."

"Yeah. Bye."

They watched her call out goodbyes to Nancy and Mike and the rest of the kids, and round the corner of the house back to the car.

"... Not a fucking word, Harrington." Steve made of show of clamping his lips together, pretended to throw a key over his shoulder. "You're such a fucking dork, Jesus."

"Yeah yeah, I know," Steve scrubbed a hand through his hair. "Look, if you really don't want to be here baby, it's fine. I'll tell everyone I got too much sun today or something, and we can just go back to my place. Or somewhere else, whatever you want." If it was the fact that it was an actual party they were attending that was freaking Billy out, informal a thing as it was, rather than just their normal keeping an eye on the kids at the pool, then Steve guessed he could understand that. Billy was right - they _were_ as good as his family, more so than his parents even, the chief of police and his ex-girlfriend included. It wasn't the people themselves so much as the setting that had gotten him so worked up, and Steve wasn't about to force him to stay if he didn't want to.

"No," Billy said, "it's cool. We'll stay."

"I don't want you to be - "

"Steve," Billy cut him off, "I said we'll stay, okay? So we're stayin'. And I don't wanna miss out on that pie."

"And here I was thinking you were doing it for me."

Billy hummed, and Steve hoped he wasn't just imagining that he was looking a looser around the edges. "Maybe a little. Mostly the pie." 

"Right," Steve said, biting back a smile, "good. That's - good. Thanks."

"Articulate as ever, pretty boy."

"Dick. Come sit with me." 

He probably should have asked Joyce if he could lend her a hand, but Billy was still looking like he wanted to bolt. He grabbed a blanket from the pile she'd brought out for the kids to sit on, and headed towards two rusty old lawn chairs in a sunny corner of the yard. He dropped the blanket down into the grass to lie on, while Billy wrinkled his nose and sat on one of the rickety lawn chairs. The blanket smelt a bit like mildew, and dry, brown grass stalks poked at his back through the holes, but he was too sleepy to care. Warm, and tired in a lazy summer afternoon kind of way. He let himself just sit for a moment. The kids were running about and yelling, ecstatic to finally be able to spend some time with El, who still wasn't allowed to go with them to the pool, just in case something happened. 

Even though he was feeling damp and sweaty, skin sticky where pool water had dried after the kids splashed him, Steve left his polo on as he settled back onto the blanket. He burnt easily and had already spent too much time lounging by the pool without it on earlier. The lawn chair creaked beside him as Billy shifted about trying to get comfortable. He was more likely to talk if Steve waited him out, rather than prodding at him until he snapped. He sighed, felt his chest sink as he breathed out deep and long. The sky felt heavy above him, thick and blue and bright, dark pines high along the skyline and the woods at the back of the house, making long shadows in the last of the sun. It made him feel a bit on edge, darkness growing thicker between the trees, birds calling out to each other as the sun sank lower. An unpleasant tingle went up along his back and he felt himself starting to freeze up, despite the sun still hot on his already slightly burnt face. But then he saw Billy out of the corner of his eye, tossing his shirt aside as he stripped down to those goddamn speedos again to catch the lingering afternoon sun, which honestly did about as good a job as anything at distracting him long enough to push that cold, constricted feeling away again. _Any chance to be as naked as possible, Jesus._ Billy settled back against the patchy cushion on the lawn chair, making a tiny quiet sigh of contentment that Steve probably wasn't meant to hear. Steve wanted to crawl up there and kiss him, taste the sweat and sunscreen, snap the waistband of that fucking swimsuit just to make him hiss and go pink. But not everyone there knew about them yet, and Steve wasn't going to out them if Billy didn't want to. Those that did know probably wouldn't appreciate the show either.

"Hey," he said, and Billy pushed his sunglasses down to look at him over the top of the frames, "how are you - "

"Steve!"

"Oh shit." The kids were pelting towards them across the yard, pollen, dust and grass seeds in all directions, and honestly Steve was a little jealous of all that energy.

"Steve," Dustin huffed as they drew closer, "hi."

"That's it?" Steve said. "'Hi?'"

"Yeah well, I wanted to say hi."

"You saw me like a half hour ago when I dropped you at your mom's, dispshit."

"El wanted to meet Billy," Max said, and Steve looked over to Eleven. His first reaction was disbelief. El was kind of aloof sometimes, and sure Steve thought Billy was great, but the kids mostly just tolerated him, and he didn't seem like the type El would particularly want to befriend. No offence to his boyfriend. But then he remembered the friendship bracelets the two girls were wearing - green for Max, yellow for El - that El had never really had any girl friends before, and according to what little Billy had said about it, the same applied to Max. They hadn't known each other long, but they'd gotten pretty close pretty quick. And despite her seeming a little distant to Steve sometimes, he guessed El usually was kind of curious about new things and new people, especially when it was something important to her friends. Billy must have counted as a 'something important.' Steve couldn't help but smile at that, big and wide and dumb, and looked across to where Billy was still sitting on the lawn chair. He looked like he couldn't quite believe what he'd just heard, one eyebrow arched sceptically and eyeing El like maybe it was all a joke, cigarette burning low between still fingers. 

"Billy," she said, stepping closer, eyes narrowed, dress grass stained from where they'd been playing around in the yard.

"El's Hopper's daughter," Steve added, because no one else had.

"Right. Uh," he shifted a little, not quite sure what to make of her. Steve's own first proper meeting with her had been similar - feeling like she was looking right through him, running her fingers over his thoughts. "Yeah. I'm Billy."

She watched him a moment longer, long enough for Billy to look even more uncomfortable and for Mike to look thoroughly bored by the whole thing, before the corner of her mouth twitched in an almost smile. "You're a good brother now. I like you." Which honestly, was pretty high praise coming from her.

"Thanks," he said. The confused little wrinkle of his nose was cute, though Billy'd probably die if he heard Steve say that out loud. Across the yard, Steve saw Joyce bringing out a small stack of packages of meat, ready for Hopper to put on the grill. 

"Are we done with this now?" Dustin said, not in the hard way that any of them once would have approached anything to do with Billy, but just plain impatience to get back to their game, or whatever it was they'd been doing before El had wanted to come over.

"Yeah," Lucas piped up, "you know I was about about to kick all your butts before El said she wanted to meet Billy."

"No you weren't," Will smiled and gently nudged at his side. And Steve had never really known the kid, but he'd heard the list of crap he'd been through second hand time and time again, as well as a little from the kid himself, and frankly it was a fucking relief to see him happy. If Will Byers could come out of all that shit smiling, there was a chance for the rest of them. 

"El just wanted to meet my brother, is all," Max said, and he saw Billy twitch. Every time she omitted the once insisted upon 'step' that came before 'brother,' he got a little... tense. Not in a bad way exactly, just not used to it yet. "And now she has, we can get back to the game where _I_ was kicking all of your butts." She shot a challenging, smug little look at Lucas.

"Hey, no way were you - "

"Shit! _Hopper!"_

There was a clatter and a yell from Joyce, the rustle and snap as the undergrowth at the corner of the yard was trampled, and then there was a demodog. Right there at the edge of the woods, whining and clicking in that horrible fucking way they did, stalking closer to the plateful of raw meat Joyce had dropped in the grass in her panic. Drool and black goop dripped from it's jaws as it nosed the bloody packaging. It looked starving, thin and even bonier than they normally did, and it must have been desperate to come at them in the daylight chasing nothing but the smell of raw burgers. One of the kids screeched and the 'dog's head snapped up, attention firmly on them now and no doubt thinking how much better they'd taste. And it was just desperate enough to try it.  
Before there was time for anything more than Hopper to start yelling and Joyce to rush over to herd the kids up, Billy was on his feet, jumping up off the rusty lawn chair and snapping it shut. The demodog was bounding toward them, Steve shouting at the kids to get behind him and stay the fuck out of the way, when Billy stepped forward and smacked it across the face with the lawn chair. The 'dog yelped and stumbled, Billy whacked it again, once, twice, and with a horrible crunching noise, it was dead, its neck snapped. There was a moment of shocked silence where everyone just gaped at Billy and the dead monster at his feet. He was glaring down at it too, still just in his fucking ridiculous red swimsuit of all fucking things, tense all over and muscles in his arms twitching, flecked with black gunk, as he took a quick drag of the smoke he'd managed to keep clamped between his teeth.

"Holy crap!" Steve heard Dustin bellow as he shouldered past Steve to go and get a closer look at the dead 'dog. His fascination with the things was fucking weird; Steve vaguely wondered if he should try and talk to him about it. Again. 

"What is it?" Nancy and Jonathan had been in the kitchen, had come running down when they'd heard the shouting, the former with a bread knife in hand. It'd all happened so quick, it was over before they even got there.

"Kid, be careful," Hopper said as he came closer too, gun ready and trained on the demodog's body, just in case. He just as well have been talking to a brick wall for all the good it did, and the kids crowded closer to get a better look. Steve was honestly surprised they were all so eager given their past run-ins with the fuckers. Personally he wanted to get the hell away from the gross bastard as quick as possible.

"Is it definitely dead?" Will approached with a bit more caution than the others - he hadn't had much to do with them when they'd first appeared, sure, hadn't come nose to nose with them like the other kids had. But those things reeked of the Upside Down, which probably wasn't something he wanted to be reminded of.

"I think so, sweetie," Joyce was right there beside him, El close to Will's other side, and reaching down to hold his hand. He'd never seen them talk all that much, but it made sense; they'd dealt with the Upside Down in worse ways than any of the rest of them had. 

"Oh my God, Dustin!" came Lucas' exasperated shout.

"What?"

"Why are you poking it?" Max joined in. "That's... Ew."

"For science, you guys," Dustin shot right back, continued to prod at the break in the demodog's neck with a stick, "we got rid of the one in the fridge before I could get a good look at it." He shot Steve a dirty look - he may have ratted him out to Mrs Byers about whose idea it was to stuff the demodog in the fridge. He'd felt guilty, okay?

Now the danger had seemingly passed for the moment - Hopper patrolling the edges of the yard just in case there were any other stragglers - everyone was laughing in nervous relief, talking over each other about what had just happened. It was then Steve realised that Billy had yet to move, was still standing barefoot in the grass a few feet away from the demodog corpse, scowling hard at it, as though daring it to come back to life so he could kill it all over again. 

"Hey," Steve said softly as he approached him to check he was still in one piece, mindful of the kids a short distance away, eye catching briefly on the fucked up angle of the 'dog's broken neck, "fuck." He looked away again. "You okay, baby?" 

Billy didn't answer, just stared at him for a moment, glazed over and breathing quick. Steve was worried that something was seriously wrong for a second, until Billy's eyes fluttered and he dropped the chair on the grass, reached out to literally grab at Steve's face, palms pressed over his ears and fingers in his hair, pressed hard into his scalp. He crushed their mouths together, graceless and desperate, an uncoordinated press of dry lips and quick breaths over chlorine-tacky skin. Steve froze up for a moment, taken by surprise, before Billy let out a tiny whine in the back of his throat, tugged gently at Steve's hair as if in complaint at his unresponsiveness, and he softened, kissed him back, smoke and sunscreen. He shouldn't have been surprised - a good fight always got Billy's blood up, his too in all honesty, and for once they'd faced off with a demodog and neither of them had gotten hurt, and it felt pretty fucking fantastic. Billy bit his lip just the uncomfortable side of too much, and Steve eased away. It wasn't until he opened his eyes again that he became horribly aware Billy'd just kissed him stupid in front of basically everyone.

"Crap."

Most of the kids looked a mix of embarrassed and grossed out. Apart from Mike, who was more just straight up grossed out. El still had half an eye on the demodog. Nancy looked like she'd been slapped, Jonathan like he'd rather be literally any place in the world other than the one he was currently in. 

"And you say I'm bad at keeping secrets," Dustin shook his head, "shit."

"Let me get this right," Hopper said, serious, bypassing police chief mode altogether and going straight into concerned parent responsible for their superpowered child and gaggle of friends who fought monsters alongside her, "you and Hargrove are... together, and he knows about demodogs?"

"Guess so," Steve said, awkward as hell and hot in the face, but making himself meet Hopper's eye.

"That's it?" Hopper pinched the bridge of his nose, shook his head. "Were you going to tell us about this at some point, or...?"

"Didn't really think the fact that I'm shacked up with Harrington here would really interest you all that much," Billy said, softness melted away and smile sharp again, fingers digging into Steve's side, on the defensive.

"I meant that Hargrove knows about the Upside Down, you little shits," he said. "What if somebody comes sniffing around again, huh? We have to have our story straight. All it takes is one crack for the lot of us to be royally fucked."

"Oh Hop, come on," Joyce elbowed him, looking far too pleased considering there was a dead demodog on her property. Again. She must have suspected, after the night Billy had dragged a bleeding Steve to her door to ask for help, and slept the night sprawled out together on her couch. "Don't pretend like you wouldn't have done the same. And if Billy here knows about the Upside Down and is dating Steve, then as far as I'm concerned, that makes him a part of the family." She smiled warmly at Billy. "You're stuck with us now, sweetie. And you seem good for each other."

"Thanks," Steve rubbed the back of his neck, grateful, but his wish to disappear still very much present.

"What are you staring at, nerds?" Billy barked at the kids, which had no where near as much of an effect as it would have done six months ago. Max just gave him a flat, unimpressed look before taking El by the hand to go help her fold some patterned paper towels into birds. Mike rolled his eyes, and followed, Dustin and Lucas ignored him altogether and started talking demodog biology again. Will smiled at them, and Steve smiled back.

Billy grumbled something Steve didn't quite hear, and stalked off to the remaining lawn chair and the old blanket in the corner of the yard. Steve followed, stumped about what he should say next.

"It's alright, you know."

"If you say so." Billy wasn't looking at him.

"Billy, I promise. They don't care," Steve insisted, "it's fine."

"Yeah it's all just fuckin' peaches and cream right now, pretty boy, but what happens when - _what the fuck?"_

"What?" Steve followed Billy's line of sight across the yard to where El had immediately abandoned paper towel swans in favour of lifting the 'dog with her powers, moving it over towards Hopper's truck so he could drive it off someplace to get rid of it later.

"What the fuck?" Billy repeated.

Steve winced. "You - you didn't know about that part, did you?"

"That Max's new best friend can make shit move with her mind? No I did not know about that part Harrington, Jesus."

"Huh." Steve hadn't told him about El to begin with, omitted her part in things, figured it would be safer if he didn't know. Billy had probably assumed the weird shit began and ended with the Upside Down and the demodogs, Steve hadn't corrected him, and it hadn't come up again. "I'll uh, I'll explain later."

Billy looked as though he was about to argue, but then Joyce appeared to hand them each a beer with a wink. They thanked her, and she went to start getting the food back on track. "You'd better."

Excitement over and the demodog out of sight, things got back to normal pretty quick. Or as normal as they ever were, anyway. Hopper got to grilling, and Billy actually volunteered to give him a hand. Joyce had back-ups in the fridge, and there was plenty to replace what had been made inedible in the demodog attack. Nancy and Jonathan helped Joyce bring the rest of the food out from the kitchen to the table in the yard, and Steve got roped into helping the kids make a fort out of the old blankets and sheets they were meant to be sitting on. He was pretty good at it actually, despite the kids laughing insistence otherwise. 

Food cooked and plates piled up, everyone sat down to eat. The kids had begged to be allowed to take their plates into the fort, while Billy and Steve retreated back to the blanket Steve had been sitting on earlier. They were eating in a mostly comfortable silence, when Nancy took it upon herself to sit with them, obviously over the shock now and had decided it was necessary that they talk, a very reluctant looking Jonathan in tow. She didn't say anything for a long moment, just picked at her coleslaw, and made sure it didn't touch the mustard from her hot dog. Unsurprisingly, it was Billy who spoke first.

"You got something to say, Wheeler?" he said in his dangerous voice, the one that made people part for him in the school halls.

"Billy," Steve tried to cut him off before it got too bad, "don't - "

"I've heard a lot of talk about you in the girls' bathroom," Nancy said to Billy, "and honestly I didn't believe the half of it. But after having seen it firsthand, it turns out you really do kiss like you're on the front of one of my mom's bodice rippers."

Steve choked on his burger, Billy just smirked and blew her a kiss. "Why, you jealous, Wheeler?"

She made a show of rolling her eyes, smile tugging up the corner of her mouth. "I didn't mean it as a compliment Hargrove. No offence, Steve."

"Uh, none taken Nance," he said, shooting Jonathan a quick _what the fuck is going on_ look, just to establish it wasn't only him seeing the bizarre conversation unfolding in front of him. Jonathan looked equally confused, thank God.

"And it's nice he finally has someone who might spend more time on their hair than he does," Nancy said.

"Wow, thanks," Steve said. "Did you come over here just to say that, or...?"

"No," Nancy primly tucked her skirt tighter under her knees. "I came over here to say that I'm glad you two have this." She turned to Billy, "and also that if you hurt him, I do have a gun."

"Shit, Nance."

"Before today, I'd have said you were bluffing, Princess Wheeler," Billy said, and Nancy scoffed at the nickname, "but I think I just about believe you."

"Wait a second," Steve cut in, "Nancy are you really giving him the _shovel talk,_ seriously? Like right now? I'm sitting right here, Jesus. Jonathan, are you seeing this shit?"

"Tough break man," Jonathan said, but even he was starting to look a little bewildered about the whole thing, goddamn traitor.

"Suck it up, sweetheart," said Billy, and threw a ketchup-smeared, balled up paper towel at his head.

"We're going to go check the the kids are okay," Nancy said once they were done eating. "They act all tough but..." she trailed off, and Steve didn't need her to finish the sentence. He understood as well as any of them. 

"Sure," he said. "See you later."

Steve and Billy stayed on the blanket a while after they'd gone, full and sleepy after double helpings of everything and a slice of Mrs Wheeler's pie. Which Billy had been a dick about. But it wasn't long before he could see Billy starting to get edgy again, when it started to sink in that pretty much all of Steve's nearest and dearest knew about them now. No going back, huh. He was hoping Billy would ease up after he had time to get used to the idea, that none of them cared, and none of them were about to go running to Billy's dad. That wasn't how they did things.  
The one immediate pro of everyone knowing they were together was that Steve could now do all the little things he knew calmed Billy down; it didn't matter anymore if anyone saw. He sat up on the blanket, prodded at Billy until he shifted to lie with his head in Steve's lap, ignoring his grumpy mumbling for Steve to leave him the fuck alone. Sometimes, it was obvious Billy really meant it when he told Steve to let him be, needed a minute to gather himself up and get his thoughts straight without Steve there. That was not one of them. He stroked at Billy's hair, fingers caught in the clumpy, chlorine tangles. He rubbed his fingertips into his scalp and the back of his neck, played with his earring, wrapped now limp curls around his fingers, and brushed it back away from his forehead. Billy had his sunglasses on again and so Steve couldn't see his eyes properly, but he was pretty sure they were closed, Billy finally relaxed enough to let his guard drop just a little, pinked up lips slightly parted as he breathed deep. Steve watched the slow rise and fall of his chest, attention absently drifting to his belly, the taught waistband of the clingy red speedos, thick thighs and the curve of his calf, and back up again. Not with any kind of intent - he was just nice to look at. The sun was almost down and he probably should probably have been wearing something more substantial, but Steve wasn't about to push him. It would be time for the fireworks soon.  
The kids had asked for music, and with the back door propped open, the sound of Joyce's Fleetwood Mac record drifted out into the yard. He saw Billy hesitate when he realised what was playing, listening in, before he nodded ever so slightly in approval.

"You like it?" Steve said. "That's a bit of a surprise, metalhead."

"My uh," Billy fiddled with the empty beer bottle in his hand, "my mom had that record."

"Oh," Steve said, "cool. She had good taste."

"Sometimes," Billy said, looking firmly up at the darkening sky rather than at Steve, "she was kind of a hippy."

Steve nodded and didn't press him for anything further. He was happy enough with those tiny fragments about her, that Billy was starting to feel okay with talking to him about her. "I love you."

Billy snorted, reached up to ease one of Steve's hands out of his hair, to link their fingers together. "You're so fuckin' sappy. I love you too."

It was probably kind of crazy, from an outside perspective, how unshaken they all were considering a demodog had gatecrashed their fourth of July party a couple of hours ago. Maybe in the beginning, they might have been more affected by it. But it was sort of their life at the moment, nasty as it might have been. They knew there were stragglers out there, left over from the all the mess they'd waded through together, but they knew they could deal with it, and they knew they could bounce back quick. Because that's what they had to do, and life was too short for them not to grab the brighter moments within their reach. Steve's nightmares would probably act up later that night, and he highly doubted he'd be the only one getting a shitty night's sleep after the sudden and unexpected reminder of the horrors they were all trying to put behind them. But if there was one time and one place he could push it all to the side just for moment, it was in the last of the sun on the fourth of July, the kids laughing somewhere behind him, the smell of warm grass and burgers and faint, lingering traces of chlorine from the pool, Billy's hot palm pressed loose and lazy with his, and knowing he'd never have to face it all alone.

**Author's Note:**

> My season three hopes are Billy in speedos, and that the two of them actually have some scenes together. They can have other love interests, that's cool, but I'm low key worried they're going to no homo us so hard and give them completely separate plot lines.


End file.
